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André Villas-Boas hails historic Tottenham win over Manchester United

by Daniel Taylor at Old Trafford 4 years ago

• We wrote history for our team, says Portuguese• Ferguson complains about too little injury time

André Villas-Boas reflected on Tottenham Hotspur's first victory at Old Trafford since 1989 and said his players should be inspired by the defeat of Manchester United and use it as the springboard to qualify for the Champions League.

"We wrote history for our team," Villas-Boas said after a dramatic 3-2 win against Sir Alex Ferguson's team. "This is a very special night for us and it must serve as an example for what we want to achieve in the future. In the end, it is just an important three points but hopefully it will also serve as an inspiration for the future."

Jan Vertonghen and Gareth Bale had put Spurs into a two-goal lead before Wayne Rooney's introduction as a half-time substitute sparked the beginnings of a revival. Clint Dempsey scored Tottenham's third within a minute of Nani making it 2-1 and, though Shinji Kagawa scored again for United almost straight away, Spurs withstood some late pressure to give Villas-Boas his best result as a manager in English football.

"We set out to win and the way we played in the first half was unbelievable, with so much authority and so much confidence," the former Chelsea manager said. "It is not common to see that on this ground and, in the second half, the way we defended showed a team that believes in each other. At half-time we knew we weren't going to get out of Old Trafford without a fight. The players were brilliant.

"Our quest is to qualify for the Champions League. It is very difficult to go for the title this season but it [the Champions League] is a place where the great teams of this country belong. We want to win a trophy this season. We want Champions League qualification."

United have now lost two of their first six fixtures, with only one clean sheet, and Ferguson blamed his players for a "sluggish" first half.

"We were brilliant in the second half – really unlucky, we hit the post, hit the bar, balls scrambled clear. We dominated it. Thank goodness I am able to say that after watching the first half."

The United manager added: "It was disappointing because the record [against Spurs] has been fantastic. They gave us four minutes [of stoppage time], that's an insult to the game. It denies you a proper chance to win a football match."